Record Details
Framework for assessing the potential safety performance of construction mechanical and electrical field employees
ScholarsArchive at Oregon State University
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Title | Framework for assessing the potential safety performance of construction mechanical and electrical field employees |
| Names |
Moghaddam Vahed, Ali
(creator) Gambatese, John A. (advisor) |
| Date Issued | 2015-03-12 (iso8601) |
| Note | Graduation date: 2015 |
| Abstract | In the field of construction safety, many researchers have worked to create assessment tools. These tools focus on different aspects of construction safety, such as assessing safety climate, safety culture, etc. Although research indicates that the majority of incidents are caused by unsafe behaviors and acts, there are no comprehensive tools for assessing the potential safety performance of field employees. Knowledge about employee's safety performance is not known to the company before employees start work; thus, such a tool would help to prevent injuries. This thesis describes a research effort to develop a safety assessment tool and framework to provide information to companies with regards to their employees' knowledge. The tool focuses on mechanical and electrical construction contractors and was developed using a comprehensive literature review, field surveys, and analysis of personal demographic factors, risk perceptions, hazard identification, and safety knowledge. The field survey had four different sections that captured demographic factors, risk perceptions, hazard identification, and safety knowledge. Using a survey methodology, a Likert scale was used to measure employees' perception of the effects of different factors. The average frequencies of four severity categories were obtained for eleven mechanical trade-related and eleven electrical trade-related risk scenarios. Employees were asked to identify hazards depicted in picture scenarios and answer safety knowledge questions. Input was provided by mechanical and electrical trade field employees, managers, engineers, and safety professionals. More than 6,500 data points were obtained from the surveys. The analytical section included response processing that converted the ratings obtained from surveys into unit risks, calculated hazard indices, and graded safety knowledge test questions. The unit risks were calculated for each of the scenarios based on the incident analysis, which was conducted on more than 1,500 OSHA incident records for mechanical and electrical trades. The data was used to create the weighing for each of the sections in the tool. Moreover, the perceptions among different survey participant groups were compared in each of the main categories. The respondents and expert panel’s responses were also compared. The results indicated that there are some differences between the perceptions of different groups. Job Security, Job Level, and Job Number showed the highest number of differences among categories. On the other hand, except for few risk measures, no appreciable differences were observed for risk variables within each demographic factor. Contrary to risk variables, differences were observed within Age, Experience, Job Level, Job security, Local Traveler, and Union Status for the Average Hazard Identification. This relationship may be used to improve occupational safety. Education and Length of Service were among the demographic factors that showed a relationship with test score. In most cases, the expert panel and the survey participants had the same perceptions about the impact of personal variables, risk factors, and hazard identification on the safety performance. Finally, the researcher compared the ranking of risk scenarios based on unit risk between OSHA records and survey participant responses. A moderate correlation was found between them. |
| Genre | Thesis/Dissertation |
| Access Condition | http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/us/ |
| Topic | Construction Safety |
| Identifier | http://hdl.handle.net/1957/55385 |
